to think that the new national curriculum proposals seem to have passed people by when actually the consequences could be terrible?

Yesterday the new proposed National Curriculum was revealed. It is a draft document that is open to consultation. I am horrified at some of the changes that are proposed and it would seem on some teaching forums others are too. Yet the story doesn't seem to be covered elsewhere. Why is this?

Will read it but it might take a while lol. What I want to know is WHY, when we're a country so in need of saving money, more of that money is being spent on overhauling something like this? Surely the one we had was good enough for now??!!!

Yes - you have a point. I guess it is too long and perhaps it is just my subject that has been affected. Will read through the other subjects to see if IABU or if I am just looking at this in too narrow a perspective.

I reckon they made it that long on purpose so no one can feasibly read it & it will get passed without opposition. Without even reading it i can imagine the kind of crap Gove is going to force us to deliver in schools. What are the issues that concern you? X

Read primary curriculum, seems to change us to a knowledge based curriculum which is what we were asked to move away from! Much more chalk and talk. To me it feels like Gove wants his own school days back. It is much more prescriptive in terms of topics for Science, Hist etc as to what must be taught each year. Not a fan but then anyone who changes schools into academies and says you don't need to be a teacher to teach is an ass!

early Britons and settlers, including: the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages Celtic culture and patterns of settlement Roman conquest and rule, including: Caesar, Augustus, and Claudius Britain as part of the Roman Empire the decline and fall of the Western Roman Empire Anglo-Saxon and Viking settlement, including: the Heptarchy the spread of Christianity key developments in the reigns of Alfred, Athelstan, Cnut and Edward the Confessor the Norman Conquest and Norman rule, including: the Domesday Book feudalism Norman culture the Crusades Plantagenet rule in the 12th and 13th centuries, including: key developments in the reign of Henry II, including the murder of Thomas Becket Magna Carta de Montfort's Parliament relations between England, Wales, Scotland and France, including: William Wallace Robert the Bruce Llywelyn and Dafydd ap Gruffydd the Hundred Years War

life in 14th-century England, including: chivalry the Black Death the Peasants Revolt the later Middle Ages and the early modern period, including: Chaucer and the revival of learning Wycliffes Bible Caxton and the introduction of the printing press the Wars of the Roses Warwick the Kingmaker the Tudor period, including religious strife and Reformation in the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, and Mary Elizabeth I's reign and English expansion, including: colonisation of the New World plantation of Ireland conflict with Spain the Renaissance in England, including the lives and works of individuals such as Shakespeare and Marlowe the Stuart period, including: the Union of the Crowns King versus Parliament Cromwell's commonwealth, the Levellers and the Diggers the restoration of the monarchy the Great Plague and the Great Fire of London Samuel Pepys and the establishment of the Royal Navy the Glorious Revolution, constitutional monarchy and the Union of the Parliaments.

How do you cover all that content? Where are the skills? How do you make that relevant to primary school children?

Soverylucky I was about to post the same - it's completely bonkers. I'd also point out that I went to a private prep school and we didn't cover a fraction of this (and nor do any private schools that I have come across recently).

Some topics could be quite interesting if taught well, e.g. Normans and the Civil War which aren't on the curriculum at the moment. However I really don't fancy having to interest 9 year olds in de Montfort's parliament.

What is also missing is the lives of everyday people, which is what children find most fascinating as they are able to compare and contrast with their own (particularly any gross/disgusting facts ala horrible histories).

It's also going to mean dropping ww2 which I find interests children the most as it is touchable - the people who were alive then are still here or only a generation away making it so much more interesting.

Interesting. The History list seems v smilar to what my children are being taught in prep schools. Though their schools seem more interested in teaching stuff, rather than making it "fun", "interactive" etc. I know that all the fun stuff has its place, but my DC are at least well informed.

Crikey - that's a lot of history to cover in KS2 Some fabulous history, but some quite boring fact based stuff that will not interest the average 10 year old at all. How to put off children at a young age IMHO.